In this episode, we deep dive into Cadence Design Systems, the San Jose-based titan of Electronic Design Automation (EDA) that has quietly powered the semiconductor revolution for over four decades. We trace the company’s origins from the 1988 merger of SDA and ECAD to its current status as a Nasdaq-100 component with a market cap fueled by the explosion of AI and custom silicon.

Key topics covered in this episode:

• The Acquisition Engine: How strategic purchases—from the 1989 acquisition of Gateway (Verilog) and the 1999 purchase of OrCAD to the massive 2025 acquisition of Hexagon’s design business for $3.16 billion—built a comprehensive portfolio.
• Beyond Chips: We analyze Cadence's pivot under CEOs Lip-Bu Tan and Anirudh Devgan toward "systems" companies like Tesla and Apple. This includes their expansion into molecular modeling for drug discovery with OpenEye and digital twins for industrial simulation.
• The AI Revolution: How Cadence is both enabling AI hardware and using AI to design chips faster with tools like Cerebrus and ChipGPT.
• Hardware & Emulation: A look at the Palladium and Protium platforms—supercomputers designed specifically to verify chip designs before they are manufactured.
• Legal Battles & Controversies: We discuss the historic "white-collar crime" drama of the Avanti trade secret theft and the major 2025 controversy where Cadence pleaded guilty to illegally exporting technology to a Chinese military university, resulting in a $140 million penalty.

Join us to understand how a company that started with circuit boards is now defining the future of aerospace, automotive, and life sciences.